PIO Social Media officers can and should schedule and automate the delivery of Twitter messages for several reasons:

1. New content from your hub and spokes may be of interest to your Twitter readers and will bring them to your Hub and Spokes – potentially for the first time.

2. Twitter readers can visit your Twitter feed at any time of day from any place in the world. If you are in the eastern time zone an 0800 post will not likely be seen by your West coast friends. Scheduling the same Tweet to post again at 1100, 1500, and 1900 eastern time will ensure that it is seen by more of your friends.

3. Use Twitter to announce upcoming events and programs by scheduling Tweets to post each day before the event. Consider making changes to each subsequent Tweet, like a ten reasons to attend list.

Remember, Twitter, like much of social media is like standing at the edge of Niagara Falls. Many social media users just have a few moments to glimpse at the raging of torrent of information that is passing by them on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or YouTube. Scheduling and automating posting of tweets increases the number of opportunities for your message to be seen.

I use two Twitter tools for scheduling and automating Tweets:

1. Twitterfeed.com “feeds your blog to Twitter.” It takes the RSS feed from my blog eps411.com and feeds the blog post title and shortened url into my Twitter account @gfriese

2. Hootsuite.com also feeds any RSS feed into a Twitter account. Hootsuite also has several other excellent features for Social Media PIOs.
a. ability to post a single Tweet to multiple Twitter accounts (Tweetdeck also has this feature).
b. ability to schedule Tweets to post in the future. Schedule a Tweet for posting several times in a single day or to repeat every day leading up to a special event.
c. a URL shortening service that allows tracking of clicks on the shortened URLs from a Twitter post.

A common question I am asked is, “Do you think readers will be annoyed if you are scheduling Tweets and reposting the same Tweet?” Potentially they will be. The risk is greatest for readers that only follow a small number of other Twitter users. If a user is only following 10 people they are looking at a trickle of Tweets and not Niagara Falls. Instead of slowing down your torrent for these users recommend other people for them to follow with a Twitter list or #FollowFriday (see Follow Friday: What is it?)

About The Author

Greg Friese has authored 47 articles for PIOSocialMediaTraining.com

Greg Friese, MS, NREMT-P is an author, podcaster, blogger, and advocate for emergency response agencies to use social media before, during, and after any incident. Greg is the Director of Education for CentreLearn Solutions, LLC. He is also the co-host of the EMSEduCast podcast and is a paramedic for a 911 agency in northeast Wisconsin

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